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Perdita, mother of his child. Do you remember in her infancy, with what
transport you beheld Clara, recognizing in her the united being of yourself
and Raymond; joying to view in this living temple a manifestation of your
eternal loves. Even such is she still. You say that you have lost Raymond.
O, no!--yet he lives with you and in you there. From him she sprung,
flesh of his flesh, bone of his bone--and not, as heretofore, are you
content to trace in her downy cheek and delicate limbs, an affinity to
Raymond, but in her enthusiastic affections, in the sweet qualities of her
mind, you may still find him living, the good, the great, the beloved. Be
it your care to foster this similarity--be it your care to render her
worthy of him, so that, when she glory in her origin, she take not shame
for what she is."
I could perceive that, when I recalled my sister's thoughts to her duties
in life, she did not listen with the same patience as before. She appeared
to suspect a plan of consolation on my part, from which she, cherishing her
new-born grief, revolted. "You talk of the future," she said, "while the
present is all to me. Let me find the earthly dwelling of my beloved; let
us rescue that from common dust, so that in times to come men may point to
the sacred tomb, and name it his--then to other thoughts, and a new
course of life, or what else fate, in her cruel tyranny, may have marked
out for me."
After a short repose I prepared to leave her, that I might endeavour to
accomplish her wish. In the mean time we were joined by Clara, whose pallid
cheek and scared look shewed the deep impression grief had made on her
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